AT&T Store — Local services in West University Place

I have been a customer of AT&T for a long time. In moving to a different address, I requested a service move, and my service at my current address got cut-off three weeks ahead of schedule. I called AT&T and got siphoned into a vortex of incompetence I had yet to experience. Someone at AT&T canceled my account instead of canceling the transfer order. I spent 6 hours on the phone being transferred back and forth from sales to support, until at 9:30 PM, the last person that I spoke to told me that Support was closed for the day to call the following morning, and hanged up! The next day I called at 8:00 am, and again I explained the problem and immediately I got the “Oh!”, and the same thing started happening, transferring back and forth. I spoke to a manager that was rude, short and transferred me to support without listening to what the issue was. Then at about the 11th transfer, a lady from the “Premium Loyalty Program” came on the phone and said that there was nothing she could do, that a new account had to be created, but the installation would take 1-2 weeks. Can you imagine spending four days with NO INTERNET, much less two weeks? God forbid! At that point, it was clear to me that I needed to look for an alternative. Although I was paid for the month, AT&T canceled my account. So writing AT&T off, I drove to Xfinity to see if I could get something done before the long weekend. On the way, I saw an AT&T store on Kirby Street and decided to pull up and give it my last try. I was desperate, trying to come to terms with the dreading possibility of being incommunicado for four days, maybe longer. As I walked into the AT&T Store at Kirby, a young man named Lance approached me, and ask how he could be of assistance. I shortly explained the situation, and instead of me getting a gesture of disappointment (as most salespeople do when they need to HELP a customer and get no commissions for it), he smiled and said: “I can help with that.” Of course, after the ordeal I had just endured by the Shenanigans pulled by his parent company, I was skeptical. How does this young man think that he can do something so confidently after I have spent close to 10 hours on the phone with those fools to accomplish nothing! Well, little did I know that Lance had a card up his sleeve. Yes, he pulled out his phone, called “his support channel” he said, and quickly explained the situation, “we need this account re-instated and the service back on like today," he said. As I listened, my level of skepticism rose. Ah, I thought to myself, at least I am going to have fun poking at this fellow once he cannot get it going also! Then after 5-10 minutes, he said that the person on the phone (AT&T) had trouble when he pulled my account; his computer froze, and he recommended he call back and speak with someone else. AHA! I thought, here we go! Even the gods are against me this weekend! Lance took it in stride, did not blink nor sweat. He dialed back, spoke to someone else, told him the “Incident number” (It was an incident all right!), shortly explained the situation and to my disbelief, amazement and eternal gratitude, got the problem resolved. When I got home, I checked the Broadband modem and status light, and they were all green! I screamed in excitement! Could it be? Did I get back and out of the Twilight Zone from which AT&T had sucked me into, a day before? I turned my computer and TV on, trying to prepare myself for the worst. How was I to face the world without the Internet for four days? God help me! I tuned Netflix on my TV, and it came on. I turned to my computer, and I was connected, and I am. AT&T you need to do some revisions on how you treat your customers and train your staff to do the right thing. Lance, thank you, you showed me, again, that one person can make a difference. You saved AT&T a customer, and you gave me more than just the Internet for the weekend; you gave me back the faith that I had lost in your company and people. Thank you again, Lance and the AT&T Store @ Kirby, Houston, Texas.

Gratefully, Maiden...

AT&T customer service has really fallen into the crapper over the past few years. At their old, flagship location on the SW freeway @ Edloe, you could walk in and actually get tech support and even phone repairs. But... I get it... that kind of customer service actually costs money... and AT&T only made $73 BILLION DOLLARS in 2024... so, can we REALLY expect them to offer great customer service???

This Kirby location seems to be little more than a retail phone seller. About a week ago the voicemail on my phone started acting up--after some kind of software upgrade or something on AT&T's end, not mine--and it was also locking up my phone as well... causing it to freeze and need to be restarted. I went to this location to see if they could do a hard restart (the online instruction for doing that for my phone weren't working) and see if they could figure out the voicemail problem. The sales person WAS able to hard reset my phone--and he fiddled with the voicemail and ended up deleting that ap from my phone... and said the only way to re-install / re-activate it was to call AT&T... even though I was standing in an AT&T store.

So, I DID that... as I was walking out their door... and 30 minutes later I was STILL on hold... waiting for support. I had to end that call eventually and called back about 2 hrs later--and got a recording about "unusually high call volumes" (again) but this time gave me the option to get a call back at some future point--within 30 min to an hr. So I chose that option and in about 45 minutes I got that call back--but it was from the billing department (I had requested tech support earlier) and she kept asking me for a PIN # that I never set up--and we went round and round about that for about 15 minutes--before I finally just asked for a supervisor... when finally asked me what I was calling about--I explained that I no longer had voicemail set up on my phone--so she transferred me to tech support--who took at least 30 more minutes to troubleshoot the problem and try several things to resolve it--ending in him asking me to hang up, turn my phone off, wait 5 minutes, and power back up--and he would call me and we would see if that solved the problem (because he had made some changes on his end that required a phone re-start to take effect). I did that... but when I powered back up I could not send or receive incoming calls... so when he tried to call me back it went straight to voicemail... and I had no way to call him back. I texted a friend and asked him to call me--it went straight to voicemail. So I thought maybe another re-start will do the trick--and that actually worked--and I now have voicemail and a working phone again... it only took me about FOUR HOURS--of online troubleshooting, driving to the AT&T store, multiple calls, long wait times, multiple support agent, etc--just to get my voicemail working again after their software updated. ...

Had an unimaginable and horrible service with Jacqui today. After an awesome experience with Chris C. to purchase 3 new phones 2 weeks prior (mine had to be ordered), I went to transfer all the data to my new phone. She approached us with a lackadaisical attitude, nonchalant demeanor, and unprofessionalism. While there she requested that I delete all the info.from my previous phone, informed me no screen protectors were in stock to protect my new phone, and that the printers weren't working to print out my transaction receipt. Shortly thereafter we departed the store and my husband attempted to call my phone to set a specific ring tone and an AT&T advisor answered my old phone because Jacqui failed to change out the Sims card during the final transfer. Upon returning to the store Manager Chris greeted us to notify us that my old phone was ringing and that Jacqui inadvertently omitted to switch out the card. At that time we asked were there any screen protectors and was the printer working and he proceeded to reply "yes" to both. He immediately went to the back to discuss the false Information with her that she'd given and proceeded to assist us with apologies. I rarely give reviews, yet since Chris C. requested that I give feedback I provided our true experience, however, I had to piggyback on the previous review sent to notify all customers...choose anyone BUT JACQUI. She continously stayed in the back throughout my almost 3 hour process. Totally unacceptable and since I couldn't review with no stars I had to give a 1star rating NOTE: We watched Maggie interact with other consumers and she was efficient, knowledgeable, and very friendly. I'm sure our experience would've been...